On Thanksgiving, many people talk about what they are thankful for. One Toledo family is thankful their son is still alive.

Eight-year-old Nicholas Goldthwaite was diagnosed with stage-four brain cancer in April. It took doctors months to figure out what was wrong, and it wasn't until one night when Nicholas was taken to the ER that his mother Patricia pushed doctors for tests.

"He did a CAT scan and he comes back and tells me there's a mass, and it's a large mass on his right side, and it was pushing his brain against each side of his skull," Patricia said.

Nicholas was admitted to the hospital immediately, and they performed surgery the next day.

He is still going through chemotherapy once a week, and he's on steroids. He has lost movement in his left hand and experiences deep pain in his ribcage.

"That kid has become my hero because of what he goes through," Patricia said.

But on Thanksgiving, Patricia says she is simply thankful her son is still alive.

"If I would have listened to the doctors and just took him home and gave him more ibuprofen to stop the headaches, they said most likely he would not have woken up," she said.

But now the bills are piling up. The home the Goldthwaites live in is not suitable, and even the wheelchair Nicholas uses doesn't fit him properly, causing a curve in his spine. So his mother's Christmas wish is for help.

"I would love to give them the space they need to fix the problems with the house, if they're fixable," she said. "It's an old house, there's a lot of problems that we just can't afford."